whenever i see a guy (well, it's usually a guy) driving around in a Hummer, especially in the burbs or something, i want to ask him if he has a small penis! i mean, really, WHY?

I don't really get the whole hummer thing either. Especially with gas prices!! DH & I have SUV's, but they're not new by any means and we spend SO much money for gas because of commuting. (well not me so much anymore) If I could get out of my road in the snow without an SUV I'd just get myself a nice little sedan, nothing crazy.

Brian has one of the few jobs that isn't affected by recessions (medical field), so honestly, so far we haven't been affected, and it's unlikely that we will be in a major way.

Since I'm not working, I personally don't have my usual play money and therefore have had to cut a lot of things out of my life (lattes, extravagent shopping sprees, etc), but that's more due to me not working than the recession!

great topic, I am a teacher so we are only getting a 1% COLA this next year (instead of the 3-4% we should be getting). But I don't want to complain because a few districts aren't giving anything. DH works for a non-profit, I don't see his salary going up this year but I don't think he will lose his job or anything. I was just talking to a friend who teaches in LA and she was the last hired in her school so she will most likely be let go because of the budget cuts, so her TTC has been put on hold because of it, which is a bummer. We only have one car, DH takes the metro, but the metro rates have gone up quite a bit lately, even still we save a lot of money by not having two cars. One of our neighbors has a hummer too and honestly they are such stupid cars...we too have an SUV, but its a small SUV, with two dogs, a child on the way and living in an area that gets pretty good ice storms I won't drive anything that doesn't handle well in weather, it also rains a ton here and my car has traction control. The home prices have not really dropped that much in Northern VA, but they are starting to a little, there are so many homes for sale. We are hoping to buy sometime in the next year-but I don't want to overbuy and wind up like so many people who are upsidedown in their homes.

ugh. i'm an underpaid teacher, so it doesn't affect me, but i don't pay the bills around here -b/c i couldn't afford them if i wanted to! dh is a mortgage broker. he owns his own company. needless to say, we'll be living on ramen soon. he is currently looking for a new job, but that's easier said than done. he's miserable and walks around with his head hung, self-loathing. there is nothing that makes him happy at this point. we bought our house about 2 years ago, and put a lot of work into it. we need to downsize, but can't b/c we can't sell the house for anything near what we paid. so in other words this economy blows.

whenever i see a guy (well, it's usually a guy) driving around in a Hummer, especially in the burbs or something, i want to ask him if he has a small penis! i mean, really, WHY?

LMAO!! Totally. There are no uncharted hills or rocky river beds to cross over here, this is Los Angeles - things are paved and relatively flat. Feel inadequate much? Lame-asses!

Morgan I particularly hate the yellow ones...where we just moved from 2 people in my building had them, complete with the requisite blaring "look at me - that sound is coming from this Hummer" music. Bleh!

I work in social services and can say that our numbers are up drastically for food stamps and medicaid. Unfortunately, I am currently on a leave of absence to finish up school so gas prices and food prices are killing me. I have started eating dinner at my mom's house three or four times a week. I sell The Body Shop products on the side for extra money and people just are not buying like they used to. I also live in Western New York in the rust belt...

LMAO!! Totally. There are no uncharted hills or rocky river beds to cross over here, this is Los Angeles - things are paved and relatively flat. Feel inadequate much? Lame-asses!

Morgan I particularly hate the yellow ones...where we just moved from 2 people in my building had them, complete with the requisite blaring "look at me - that sound is coming from this Hummer" music. Bleh!

I hate the yellow ones the most too. There should be a song called "look at me, I drive a hummer" that they can blast as they drive around.